The new comet of the World Cup, Johannes Klaebo has invented a new style that's really worked well for him. It's a kind of running or jumping stride / herringbone.

Notice how high he lifts the back ski. They say this way allows for max weight over the grip zone, and frequency can be increased as well. Looks both funny and cool at the same time, what do you think?

Seems he is also working on new and improved techniques in the other styles as well.

Last edited by Neuro on Sun Apr 30, 2017 9:52 am, edited 1 time in total.

Yes, it is a both effective and funny looking technique. A diagonal stride without gliding. Cross-country skiing was originally called "skidlöpning" ("ski running") in Swedish, so this new(?) technique is back to the roots.

When you look at the original video, other skiers are doing something somewhat similar, except they don't lift the skis as much off the ground as Johannes Klaebo. Let's say track runner A is running with his usual gait, and runner B running a bit faster using the so-called "skipping" (high knees)Does it mean that skipping is a superior running technique that makes runner B run faster? Of course not. In skipping (same as in Klaebo technique) you lift your legs off the ground more than necessary for the forward propulsion. This means wasted energy.Runner B and Klaebo are running/skiing faster because they are (at least at that specific moment) noticeably fitter/stronger than their competition.

Well, let's wait and see then. This technique will likely be analyzed, and most importantly MEASURED during the off season.If it is superior to the current technique, we may see a lot of competitors adopting it for the 2017/18 races, otherwise, it will be just a flash in the pan.

At the core, maybe one can see it like running without skis up a hill normally compared to dragging the feet low and waddling, herringbone style. Same for striding, but here with a gliding move.

Maybe it's more tiring like you say, but they say faster. But then double poling has replaced a lot of double pole kick striding areas from before, despite it being more tiring, showing that it's the speed of the technique which counts.

I doubt it will be a measure of its success if all start using it next season, as it's pretty specialized and against the grain of most, one would need a bigger time scale than that to say one way or the other.

Maybe it's more tiring like you say, but they say faster. But then double poling has replaced a lot of double pole kick striding areas from before, despite it being more tiring, showing that it's the speed of the technique which counts.

This is an interesting point. The new technique may indeed be faster, but at what cost? It's not clear if double-pole is indeed more tiring than kick double-pole, and if so, the difference is small. Hence, it was practical to adopt double-pole for the long distance races.This new "running" technique appears to be very high-energy, and may not be suitable for anything but short sprints uphill.The use cases for short sprints uphill are few, so this may not bring big changes to the sport such as double-poling .

I enjoy a unique herringbone technique that's faster than herringbone, but it's not legal for classic racing. But it is not skating. It involves striding and gliding but to each side with zero skate or edging aspect. It does let one get grip from an angled ski which has a lower incline and thus better grip and then it lets you glide to the other side which also is at an angle and so is glided up a less steep slope. But there is zero skating. It's not at all skating but it does break the rule of classic skiing in that gliding has to be done w skis parallel to direction of travel. Too bad that this form of classic uses glide at an angle but not with a skate motion. I suppose judges couldn't discern what was happening, but actually maybe they could. It looks different from skating. I made a video of it:

JeffOYB wrote:I enjoy a unique herringbone technique that's faster than herringbone, but it's not legal for classic racing. But it is not skating. It involves striding and gliding but to each side with zero skate or edging aspect. It does let one get grip from an angled ski which has a lower incline and thus better grip and then it lets you glide to the other side which also is at an angle and so is glided up a less steep slope. But there is zero skating. It's not at all skating but it does break the rule of classic skiing in that gliding has to be done w skis parallel to direction of travel. Too bad that this form of classic uses glide at an angle but not with a skate motion. I suppose judges couldn't discern what was happening, but actually maybe they could. It looks different from skating. I made a video of it:

JeffOYB wrote:I enjoy a unique herringbone technique that's faster than herringbone, but it's not legal for classic racing. But it is not skating. It involves striding and gliding but to each side with zero skate or edging aspect. It does let one get grip from an angled ski which has a lower incline and thus better grip and then it lets you glide to the other side which also is at an angle and so is glided up a less steep slope. But there is zero skating. It's not at all skating but it does break the rule of classic skiing in that gliding has to be done w skis parallel to direction of travel. Too bad that this form of classic uses glide at an angle but not with a skate motion. I suppose judges couldn't discern what was happening, but actually maybe they could. It looks different from skating. I made a video of it:

I note that sometimes in my video I do use the reasonably illegal DIAGONAL SKATING technique to show the difference b/w it and my wonderful striding gliding herringbone which is sadly illegal.

(probably posted it here years ago)

To me it looks like Diagonal V, the lowest gear in the skating technique. If you edge the ski or not is not important from a competition judge's view point, I believe.

As I said, I change between Diagonal Skating and Gliding Herringbone in the video. They are very different techniques. Gliding Herringbone, as I said, has zero skating involved. That is, there is ZERO glide during the kick. The ski stops and grips as per classic. In ALL skating there is glide during kicking. However, I agree there is no easy way to distinguish them so judges just lump this type of classic skiing in with skating. Thus they use the rule about skis can only glide in direction of travel, or the trail, or whatever it is, rather than the actual definition of classic which i think should be that the ski STOPS and grips to provide traction for glide-power. And so we lose this one aspect of classic from the need for easy judging and not because it's a skate. And so it's not legal for racing. However, it's fun and useful for all classic skiers.

Last edited by JeffOYB on Fri Oct 06, 2017 7:34 am, edited 1 time in total.

MN Hoser wrote:Klaebo's technique is not new. High School skiers have been doing it around here for years.

Jay

It's gotta start somewhere then break out.

I just read how Siitonen was skating on the World Loppet circuit when Koch who was just visiting the scene noticed it and dialed it in further then brought it out to the World Cup scene. I'd think others were also noticing Siitonen at that time and copying him on the Loppets but it just didn't break out til Koch took it up to the premier level.